Smoked foodstuffs are popular among consumers due to the flavour that smoking imparts to the foodstuff. Smoking of foodstuffs also provides the ability to preserve and/or cook the foodstuff together with imparting flavour.
Foodstuffs are smoked by way of exposing the foodstuff to smoke which is produced by burning a material such as wood. Because the smoking of foodstuffs can take many hours to complete, the material that is burnt to produce the smoke must be repeatedly removed and/or replaced.
There exists smoking apparatus for ‘amateur’ cooks which include a single heat source that burns material in order to smoke the foodstuff. However, while relatively inexpensive, these apparatus are very labour intensive, requiring regular supervision of the apparatus over a long period of time with the operator removing burnt material and replacing with fresh material to be ignited and burnt by the heat source. These apparatus may not be able to produce product in compliance with modern acknowledged food preparation practices.
There also exists complex automated systems which automatically feed material to be burned in the form of sawdust and then feeds further sawdust as required. Whilst the labour requirement is reduced, these systems are generally large in size, complex and expensive to purchase and maintain.
The above discussion of background art is included to explain the context of the invention. It is not to be taken as an admission that any of the material referred to was published, known or part of the common general knowledge at the priority date of any of the claims of this specification.